onies. In return, Jefferson, received Hamilton's support for a bill requiring the relocation of the national capital from New York City to Philadelphia for a period of 10 years, and thence to a permanent location to be selected in the South.
The First Bank of the United States was chartered in 1791, and the shares in this bank sparked additional securities trading in the United States. Securities trading now began to assume and importance that caused New York City securities traders to demand a facility of their own (similar to the Philadelphia Stock Exchange), where they could escape the near monopoly of the auctioneers. The outcome of this demand was the Buttonwood Tree Agreement in 1792 that created the New York Stock Exchange. The agreement provided that securities brokers would deal only with one another (excluding the auctioneers). Thus, was established the formal stock market in New York City. Soon thereafter, a third American stock exchange was established in Baltimore.
Securities trading in the United States was further stimulated subsequent to 1792 through the establishment of legal rights for corporate entities. Historian Charles Beard (1913) argued that the Constitution of the United States was, from the beginning, basically an economic document. To support his contention, he drew heavily on The Federalist, and other writing by James Madison, Alexander Hamilton, and John Jay. When the Constitution was being drafted, Madison pressed for Congressional authority to grant corporate charters. This move was defeated, and authority to grant corporate charters remained with the states. The right of corporations to exist without undue state interference, thus, was not yet established.
Two significant judicial cases established the right of corporate enterprises to exist without undue state interference. In 1819, Chief Justice John Marshall classified corporate charters as contracts, and the provisions of such c...